


where the love-light gleams

by zipegs



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Baking, Cannibalism, Christmas Cookies, Christmas Fluff, Domestic Fluff, Established Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter, Hannibal Lecter Loves Will Graham, M/M, Past Molly Graham/Will Graham, Post-Season/Series 03, Slice of Life, Will Graham Loves Hannibal Lecter, a little sprinkling of light angst, in the form of poignant reflection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-25
Updated: 2020-12-25
Packaged: 2021-03-10 22:36:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,756
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28314660
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zipegs/pseuds/zipegs
Summary: “You woke up early,” WilI interrupts, eyebrows ratcheting up toward his hairline, “to make us Christmas cookies.”
Relationships: Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter
Comments: 4
Kudos: 60
Collections: Fannibal Holiday Gift Exchange 2020





	where the love-light gleams

**Author's Note:**

  * For [faaulkner](https://archiveofourown.org/users/faaulkner/gifts).



> I got some really incredible cookies from [faaulkner](https://archiveofourown.org/users/faaulkner) for the Fannibal Gift Exchange this year and immediately contracted Hannigram-cookie-baking brainrot, so here we are! Hope you enjoy; I couldn't _not_ do something about it!
> 
> Because I’m a disaster, I didn’t finish this in enough time to get it off to a beta, so any mistakes are 100% mine.

By the time Will wakes, Hannibal’s side of the bed has long since grown cold. That itself isn’t necessarily surprising—Hannibal never sleeps much, and while it isn’t always the case, Will often rises to find him dressed and going about his day.

What _is_ somewhat suspicious is the thick, sugary fragrance wafting up from the first floor, strong enough to overpower the flowers and pine that have scented the house ever since Hannibal began to decorate for the holidays several weeks ago.

 _(Despite the comparatively tame aesthetic of their current home, Hannibal’s decorations are almost as extravagant as they were in Baltimore—luscious wreaths, brightly colored flowers, the occasional macabre accent. Will convinced him to make a few concessions—Hannibal had been caught by his taste once before, and Will didn’t intend for Christmas decorations, of all things, to_ _betray them to the FBI—but the result could hardly be called modest.)_

If the scent curling in through the open bedroom door weren’t quite so cloyingly _caramel_ , Will wouldn’t think much of it. Hannibal has surprised him with sweet breakfasts before, like variations on crepes or french toast, but there’s something about _this particular_ scent that’s too overwhelmingly sweet to be anything other than dessert. Though there’s a buttery veneer to the fragrance, there’s nothing truly savory to set it off. Nothing substantial enough to carry a meal.

_(That’s something Will wouldn’t have been able to pinpoint, before. It wasn’t until Hannibal that fragrance took on life—that butter became distinguishable from shortening and orchids from peonies. Of all the marks Hannibal has left on him, this one is especially subtle, but it’s pervasive, too. Something that will stay with him. Though he supposes the same could be said of every scar he and Hannibal have carved into each other, for better or worse.)_

Will sits up, folding back the blankets, and swings his feet over the edge of the bed. Though he feels rested, sleep still clings to the corners of his eyes; he rubs at them with his knuckles, and envies Hannibal’s ever-easy switch from dreaming to waking. He always slides into alertness with all the ease of thumbing a well-greased latch—when he succumbs to sleep to begin with.

It doesn’t take Will long, though, to shake off the vestiges of drowsiness. By the time he’s finished dressing, it has receded entirely and left nothing but the prickle of curiosity in its wake.

Hannibal is there when Will enters the kitchen, standing over a countertop dusted with flour—though none of it, Will notes, appears to so much as smear his half apron. He looks up, hair falling loosely over his forehead and lips lifted in an easy smile that, were Will not so focused on whatever it is Hannibal has been _doing_ in the kitchen at eight-thirty in the morning, would make his heart turn over in his chest.

“Good morning, Will.”

Will feels his brows crawling up towards his hairline. He surveys the mess of flour and dough on the counter—although _mess_ is an exaggeration, because Hannibal is just as meticulously neat while cooking as at any other time—and frowns.

“Are you _baking?_ ”

Hannibal’s smile deepens, settling further into his cheeks and eyes. He turns back toward the counter and takes something from beside his large glass bowl. “Would you mind stirring the pot on the stove?”

A familiar fond exasperation creeps up Will’s spine. He does as Hannibal says, crossing directly to the primary source of the sweet, rich scent, and stirs it slowly. “Caramel?”

“Dulce de leche,” Hannibal responds, still focused on the dough rolled out before him.

“From scratch?”

That makes Hannibal pause; he draws back slightly, casting Will a look over his shoulder. “Of course.”

“How long have you been awake?”

“Several hours. The milk needed time to reduce, and I had to wrap your Christmas present.”

“You could’ve waited.” Will feels his face twisting in a mixture of amusement and disbelief. He doesn’t try to temper it. “Just—told me to leave the room, like any normal person would have.”

_(Though he sometimes feigns irritation at Hannibal’s theatrics, there’s something invigorating—and occasionally exhausting—about being with someone so prone to extravagance and indulgence, mystery and intrigue. He had thought that as the dust settled, so to speak, Hannibal’s showy decadence would recede—like a peacock’s feathers settling after his mating dance ended—but it seems there are some airs that can never be fully dropped.)_

After Will sets the spoon back on the small ceramic spoon rest, he comes to stand beside Hannibal, leaning his hip against the edge of the counter as he peers down more closely at it. The dough on the countertop is rolled out into a thin oval, and Hannibal is cutting scalloped circles from it with a small metal cookie-cutter.

Will’s heart stutters in his chest. 

_(He and Molly and Walter used to make Christmas cookies together every December. Right in the beginning of the month, because Molly insisted they needed enough time to enjoy them, and what was the point, Will, if December was three-quarters over before you even ate a single sugar cookie? Invariably, they went so stale by the twenty-fifth that even the fat slices of white bread Molly used to slide into the tupperware containers to revive them weren’t enough to turn them soft again, so in Will’s opinion, they weren’t actually Christmas cookies, just December cookies._

_He used to tease her about it as she snipped off the end of the plastic tube of sugar-cookie dough, and she’d toss her head back and laugh, brandishing the scissors at him as she told him he was more than welcome to make another fresher batch before Christmas if it bothered him that much. And Will would grin and chuckle and tell her he’d think about it, and he’d try not to cringe as she peeled the greasy wrapper from the dry log of dough, try not to think how much better the cookies would taste if they made them from scratch instead of settling for something off the shelf.)_

“Will? Everything all right?”

He scrapes the memory off like bubblegum from the tread of his shoe, and forces himself back to the present.

“You’re making Christmas cookies,” he says dumbly. The ache in his chest has not fully receded, but there’s a small smile tugging at his lips, at odds with the furrow cut into his brow. “Isn’t that a little… trite, for your taste? After all, sugar cookies are sugar cookies—no matter the added flair.”

Hannibal indicates an empty metal baking tray with his chin; automatically, Will starts pulling scraps of dough away from the shapes Hannibal has cut out. 

It’s a natural impulse to fall into stride beside Hannibal. There’s a comforting familiarity to it—Hannibal as chef and Will as sous chef—that helps settle the last of Will’s churned emotions.

He lays the newly freed cookies on the tray in neat rows of four as Hannibal finishes stamping the last few scalloped rounds, and starts to gather the discarded strips into something resembling a ball. The dough is slow to stick together again, the dusting of flour on its bottom rendering it dry and shaggy.

_(In Maine, Molly and Walter used to do most of the work. Will would ferry trays to and from the oven and clean the dishes once the job was finished, but that was the extent of his involvement. He’d watched, mostly, with a short glass of eggnog in his hand and a deep ache in his stomach, as Walter and Molly elbowed each other’s ribs and flicked flour into each other’s faces, cutting out misshapen snowmen and lopsided ornaments and broken stockings. It was domestic, and familial, and something he was never truly part of.)_

“These are alfajores,” Hannibal says primly _._ He sets the cookie-cutter aside and wipes his hands on the red dishtowel slung over his shoulder. “Although they are served year-round here in Argentina, their predecessor, the Spanish alfajor, is still largely a Christmas dessert. There are a number of differences between the two—most markedly, Spanish alfajores are composed of a single cookie, and do not boast the same sweet filling.”

“You woke up early,” WilI interrupts before Hannibal can continue, eyebrows ratcheting up toward his hairline, “to make us Christmas cookies.”

Hannibal is silent for a moment. His gaze flits to Will, and then back to the counter.

“Yes.” 

Affection drags at him like an undertow. Will thinks of chicken soup and hospital rooms, of the tender, romantic gestures Hannibal has made over the years. For all his faults, he is sentimental and caring and indulgent, and though he sometimes hides his displays behind opulence and aesthetics, there is a simplicity at their core that never fails to steal Will’s breath.

The ache of memory in his chest dulls into something fond and a little incredulous. Like scar tissue, it tugs at him still, but Hannibal soothes the twinge like sweet oil. He wonders if that was the point—if Hannibal knew, somehow, what this would mean to him. How it would pierce him, and how it would heal.

He never does anything by half measures, Will thinks, leveling Hannibal with a look that is both affectionate and accusatory.

When Hannibal meets his gaze, it is with an entirely forced innocence. “I believe the first batch should be nearly finished baking—if you would remove them from the oven?”

Will’s lips twitch, suppressing a smile. After a moment, he acquiesces, taking the hot pad from the counter and bending to pull open the oven door. A hot breath of air greets him—all sugar and butter, mouth-watering in its intensity. He pulls the cookies out and sets them atop the empty burners on the stove.

“They smell fantastic,” he admits. He doesn’t need to look at Hannibal to sense his smile.

“I may have altered the conventional recipe slightly,” Hannibal says. “Some of the butter was replaced with lard.”

The offhand way he responds—an intentional lightness of tone, with some hint at deeper meaning—has suspicion curling at the base of Will’s spine. He turns back toward Hannibal and arches a brow. “Lard?”

Hannibal’s cheeks are lifted, his eyes sparkling. “Rendered it myself. I find it lends the cookie a deeper, more complex flavor.”

Will regards them with a calculating eye. Understanding sparks through him. “Fortunate that we had the necessary parts to spare. What does one use to render lard?”

“There are a number of varieties, though the difference mainly comes from the cuts of meat from which the fat is rendered. Leaf lard boasts the mildest, most delicate flavor, but it is difficult to replicate, as it comes from a very distinct deposit of fat. In this case, I used trimmings from the loin and kidneys, which I set aside while preparing several of our recent meals,” Hannibal says. “I would have found some other suitable additive, should that have not been an option.”

Will plucks a cookie from the tray. Turns it over between his fingers, passing it from hand to hand when its heat becomes unbearable against his skin.

“They need time to cool,” Hannibal says. “And then we will fill them.”

“We?”

“Of course. After all, this sort of thing is meant to be a family endeavor.”

_(There’s something so foreign about family, he’d told Hannibal once. Like an ill-fitting suit. But that hadn’t stopped him from trying them on—with Abigail, with Alana, with Margot and Molly and Walter… Some men, he knows, aren’t made to be husbands or fathers. Will had been like Goldilocks, stuck in a purgatory of too unstable, too damaged, too much this and not enough that. Hannibal twists that knife at times, but Will knows that there is something pointed in each jab. Something jealous and desperate to prove itself—to remind Will that he belongs here, at Hannibal’s side, as though there is any other place he would rather be._

_You’re family, Will, Hannibal had said. You’re family. The words are still echoing in his mind.)_

A smile spreads across Will’s face, slow and honest. It’s still strange to conceptualize, at times; he can have this. Despite all his losses, he finally _has_ found a suit that fits—even if it isn’t the cut or style he had envisioned for himself.

Somehow, that only makes it all the more beautiful. 

He sets the cookie on the counter and glances at the pot on the stove. “Doesn’t mean we can’t sneak a taste now.”

Hannibal arches a brow. “Impatient, are we?” he teases, but he inclines his chin, and that’s all the permission Will needs.

He spoons some of the dulce de leche onto the cookie and lifts it, holding it precariously between the very ends of his thumb and forefinger. It isn’t steaming, but Will blows on it before breaking off an edge with his teeth. He doesn’t miss the amused glint in Hannibal’s eye as he does so. Crumbs pepper the floor, dropping down the front of Will’s shirt and likely catching on the waist of his pants, his belt. Hannibal says nothing of it, just steps closer with a hungry gaze that makes Will smile, closed-lipped, around his mouthful of cookie.

Flavor bursts over his tongue—sweet and buttery and rich, with notes of caramel and brandy and vanilla. He doesn’t restrain the appreciative noise that rises in the back of his throat, and it is that more than anything, Will thinks, that lures Hannibal to close the distance between them.

He brings a hand to the side of Will’s face, thumb tracing just below Will’s bottom lip as he finishes chewing. The fingers of his other hand circle around Will’s wrist, and he bends so that he can bite a piece of his own off the cookie in Will’s hand. Hannibal holds his gaze the whole time, closing his mouth around the side opposite the one Will had bitten. He only pulls back slightly as he chews, his motions slow and deliberate and intoxicatingly sensual.

Once he swallows, Hannibal licks his lips, and Will can’t help the way his eyes are drawn to the flash of his tongue, the soft line of his mouth. His wrist is still caught in Hannibal’s hand, Hannibal’s other thumb still tracing some invisible line beneath his bottom lip, and his heart beats quick and loud within the confines of his chest.

Will opens his mouth to utter some vague praise, some familiar flattery of Hannibal’s culinary prowess. But before he can dislodge the words from his chest, Hannibal is kissing him, licking easy and deep into Will’s mouth.

He tastes like sugar and caramel, and his body is warm where it touches Will’s own, his fingers a welcome pressure against Will’s wrist.

Will gives in to it easily, sliding his free arm around Hannibal’s waist and tilting his head to deepen the kiss. But just as he does, Hannibal pulls back, and Will finds himself leaning forward to chase his mouth.

Hannibal does not indulge him.

When Will opens his eyes, Hannibal is smiling at him—an honest, open smile that shows his teeth. Will fists his hand in the back of Hannibal’s shirt, catching cloth and apron alike between his fingers.

“You taste decadent,” Hannibal says, and Will feels his face break into a radiantly amused grin.

“My compliments to the chef.”

Hannibal hums. The thumb that was resting below Will’s mouth now rubs gentle circles into Will’s collarbone. “Would you put the next tray in the oven?” he asks. “The sooner we finish, the sooner we can leave them to cool.”

Will barks out a laugh and dislodges himself from Hannibal’s grip, releasing his hold on Hannibal’s clothing. “Don’t have to tell me twice.”

He pops the last bite of cookie into his mouth and brushes his hands together before retrieving the tray from the counter. By the time he sets it in the oven, Hannibal has returned to his station beside the bowl and is rolling out Will’s ball of scraps.

With affection still warm and liquid in his chest, Will comes up behind him. Wraps his arms around Hannibal’s waist and rests his chin on Hannibal’s shoulder.

Hannibal tenses for a moment before relaxing into the touch. When he does, Will turns his face to nose just behind his ear.

“Merry Christmas, Hannibal,” he murmurs, and he feels Hannibal’s answering smile.

“Merry Christmas, Will.”

**Author's Note:**

> Although I have eaten alfajores and visited Argentina, that’s about the extent of my familiarity with them both. Also, my knowledge of lard is entirely theoretical. All the “research” for this fic came from Wikipedia and assorted sites of various trustworthiness, so I apologize if there are any inaccuracies!
> 
> Thanks for reading, and Merry Christmas if you celebrate it! I also want to give one last huge thank you to [faaulkner](https://archiveofourown.org/users/faaulkner) for such a tasty, beautiful gift and to the Fannibal Gift Exchange mods for organizing this!


End file.
